Absit Omen RPG

"Yes, yes, I'll be sure to let you know," Isobel assured him, albeit somewhat impatiently. She didn't see any prospect of such a thing, but then she supposed that it would be somewhat odd to have a premonition about having a vision. Who knew? The future was, for the most part, as much of a closed book to her as it was to anyone else unless she chanced to discover something or else was particularly looking into it through other means. Which reminded her, she really would have to take a look at the cards this evening; anything that she could glean about her future employment here would likely come in useful tomorrow. "Although I reserve the right to do so at the most appropriate moment."

Isobel sighed and did not deign to reply. She had spent quite enough time over the years being mocked and laughed at by people for her abilities, or rather because of their lack of belief therein, to know when she was not likely to win, and although it had to be said that she was sure the Headmaster's teasing was generally good-natured and not intended to offend, it was just not worth the effort that it would have taken to put together a polite and sensible response. "It would be greatly appreciated," was as far as she went. Merlin only knew that gasps and wide eyes were not what she was aiming for in her lessons; she expected her students to be rational and to exercise good self-control, and if all that they were doing in her class was giggling and getting worried about what might happen to them in the future then they were clearly in the wrong room so far as Isobel was concerned. Where they would be better suited, she neither knew nor cared, but they definitely ought to be someone else's problem.

"Not so far as I can see, I don't think," she mused, glancing around the room with a speculative eye. "An awful lot of this is going to have to go, of course; I suppose you have no objections?" Not that it would make any difference as far as she was concerned, but t was polite to ask, she supposed.

Isobel regarded the younger witch with a flatly unimpressed expression. To be perfectly frank, she would never, even on her worst days, have dreamed of addressing a teacher in such a fashion, and that was saying something considering that even she herself was quite happy to admit that she had been something of a problem student when she had been at Hogwarts. But there were some lines which one did not cross; the faculty at Hogwarts were all highly intelligent, as she had recognised even then, and to apply an inappropriate insult simply made you look even more of a fool than the person that you were insulting.

"I might apply the same comment to you," she pointed out, taking her wand from her pocket and flicking it towards the stack of parchment on the floor, which neatly shuffled itself back into a tidy pile and rose steadily into the air to hover in front of her, a position from which she could easily reclaim it. "Might I enquire just what you believe yourself to be doing, racing around the corridors like a house elf with a flaming tea towel wrapped around your waist? I can assure you that there are very few less intelligent things which you could be doing in these circumstances. Juggling first years might possibly qualify, but only barely." After all, people walked around carrying all sorts of weird and wonderful things in this castle, and being hit by some of them could have distinctly unpleasant consequences. "Perhaps you would care to apologise?"

There were few things which drew Isobel down from her tower these days; she was not inclined to spend more of her time than she could avoid in pushing through the gaggles of students who seemed to inhabit the corridors on a semi-permanent basis, giggling and gawping in corners. Merlin above, had she been as bad when she was a teenager? Probably, if she was entirely honest with herself; those days seemed a long way off now, though there was no denying that even then, she had hardly been the most sociable type. Her options had been rather more limited, of course; she had had no tower to which she could escape and so she had had to take at least some part in the inane chatter which seemed to characterise student life- it was either that or spend her entire Hogwarts career sitting in empty classrooms by herself, and antisocial or not, that had never seemed an appealing option to the Scot.

Just now, she was very much appreciating the value of her secluded classroom as she did her best to weave between the crowds; laughing Gryffindor boys heading one way met giggling Ravenclaw girls going the other, both stopped to admire the view, and there you had it. Complete chaos, carnage, and gridlock. Haven't you got classes to get to? was a phrase which Isobel was growing more and more tired of repeating, but it was at least the easiest method of straightening things out. Of course, they had all been well aware of their educational commitments prior to the question, which was largely rhetorical, but for some strange reason, actually being asked seemed to motivate them to get there on time. The minds of teenagers were strange things.

It was the lack of concentration that was her undoing; her mind lingering on the past, as it was so often wont to do, she neglected to pay the slightest attention to the present, and so she really only had herself to blame when she found herself coming violently into contact with a Gryffindor girl, the stack of parchment under her arm sliding to the floor.

"Not every negative reading implies imminent death, Headmaster," Isobel pointed out reprovingly, barely repressing a roll of the eyes. That was the trouble with the melodramatic fools who tended to do most Divination teaching around the world; it created such a false impression of the art, and she could hardly blame those people who viewed the whole thing as the preserve of idiots and charlatans. Lack of finesse, that was the trouble, and a credulous attitude to the results presented to you by your readings. She set the teacup back in its place with a clink of the china against the stonework. "I should say that no one is in danger of more than a mild burn, judging from that cup. Of course, I dare say some would disagree with me, but then some would See anything so long as they could get a gasp out of it."

Isobel watched the man pacing around the room with a faint turn to her lips that signified disapproval; she couldn't stand casual interference with her equipment, but for once she chose to remain silent on the matter; the more she argued, she felt, the longer the man would stick around for, and though she didn't object particularly to him so far as people went, she wanted nothing more than to take a few decent Scouring Charms to the place, get rid of those godawful curtains, get everything generally cleaned up and sorted out... She could not abide things in such a state with hangovers of her predecessors in every corner; Isobel intended to do things her own way, and she would not stand for opposition.

"I shall," she agreed, following his gaze to the teacup on the windowsill and taking a few steps towards it, lifting it between slender fingers and tilting her head slightly to examine its contents. The witch sighed slightly. "Oh, dear. Not looking too bright for someone."

"Delightful," Isobel returned, somewhat shortly, as she flicked her wand to levitate a stack of mouldering textbooks off a chair so that she could lower herself into it, albeit with some hesitancy. The thing didn't look as though it would stand up to a great deal of strain, and although she would not categorise her weight as such, you could never be too careful. She made a vague gesture in the direction of another such piece of furniture- at least, she thought it was probably furniture, though it was somewhat difficult to tell- to indicate that the Headmaster should feel free to sit down as well if he so chose. This was his castle, after all.

"It might be best," she agreed, recalling the horrors of early morning commuting, especially since, as she recalled, Hogwarts did not allow direct Apparation into one's classroom. "The man sounds eminently sensible to me." Few would choose to live surrounded by the constant chatter of young voices; herself, Isobel thought she would be isolated from most of it up here in her tower. "No doubt I shall meet him in due course." Isobel had been described as prickly herself from time to time; she was not one to judge.

Isobel raised an eyebrow. "No, I'm quite sure you would have noticed," she agreed. "A few hundred students with nothing to eat are not easily ignored, after all." And she ought to know; she'd taught plenty of classes just before lunch, and it was not a pleasant experience by any means. Still, it was a source of amazement to her that anyone could forget about house elves- of course, they were very good at being self effacing, but even so, if they disappeared, it would definitely be noticeable. She'd give it a week before the whole place fell apart. No food, no cleaning... Isobel would admit that she wasn't sure if the house elves were responsible at all for maintenance, but it wouldn't at all surprise her; they seemed to do more or less everything else.

"I dare say I'll manage," she assured the man, brandishing her wand threateningly in the direction of a pile of debris, which collapsed slowly, exuding a cloud of dust. "It won't be the first time. But I trust you have no objection to my removing some of this rubbish altogether? Honestly, I haven't a clue how any competent Divination professor could have worked with such things whatever their state of repair..." The witch sighed. Of course, competent Divination professors were a rare thing these days; people saw it as a wishy-washy subject, and so they appointed wishy-washy professors in order to teach it.

Isobel sniffed. "Paperwork and marking," she told him, giving the man a sharp look. Seeing was a gift, it was true, but like any gift, it was best used sparingly, and she had no intention of using it to See what she was quite sure would be a perfectly ordinary term. Besides, it wasn't as though it was the sort of thing that one just did on the way down for dinner; she never felt quite the same for hours afterwards, and with a day of teaching ahead of her tomorrow, she had no intention of spending the night wrestling with a Sight-induced migraine.

"I find that there are few things which are important enough to warrant foresight which do not intrude themselves upon my attention without invitation," she continued, drawing her own wand from her pocket and flicking it irritably in the direction of a hanging piece of drapery, which collapsed slowly into a pile of dust. "And for the time being, I suspect that I shall be preoccupied with sorting out the state of affairs up here. You do still have house elves, I suppose?" She was surprised at them; the Hogwarts elves that she had known would never have allowed any room, no matter how remote, to fall into such a state if there was a remote prospect of its being needed.

Isobel was uncharacteristically silent as they ascended the steps into the Divination classroom, her mind taking her back somewhere around five decades into the past when she had climbed these stairs for the first time, hoping and expecting to find at their summit someone who could help her to understand the gift with which she had been struggling all her life. And she had found that and more; she'd found a subject that she had loved and had taken in in a way which she could not say that she had any other. A subject which had, as things transpired, gone on to change her life... Her own Divination professor had seemed quite an antique, but she realised that she herself was probably of an age or even older now. It was strange how time changed your perceptions.

Particularly so when it came to the classroom. Now, as the curtains sprang open, it looked tired and old. Here and there were features that she recognised, but the passage of half a century and she trembled to think how many different occupants had done much to change the place. Not beyond repair, thankfully, and she had quite clear ideas on what she intended to do with the room.

She gave the Headmaster a disapproving look. "My dear sir, if wiggling fingers and words like vibe and ambiance are going to form regular parts of our conversations, I fear that we shall not get on as well as we might. The room is perfectly serviceable, thank you." It was always a good idea to have a room somewhat removed from the main body of the castle; one tended to be interrupted less often.

Isobel nodded briskly, glancing around her with a wry smile as she made her way up towards the classroom in which she had spent so much time over her Hogwarts years. "Very sensible. It's quite incredible how much work it takes to undo inadequate teaching." Far more than she cared to have to put in during her first few weeks, that was for certain; it took time to get on top of things in any case, and once additional problems began cropping up, trouble was on the way.

"Oh, I've dealt with more than bats in my time." Not that there hadn't been a couple of old ones on the staff at Beauxbatons, but she'd got on top of that in short order; there was no time for hidebound tradition these days. The tour of Hogwarts had been more than enough to reinforce that; it had not exactly been necessary so far as the buildings were concerned, considering the fact that they probably hadn't changed much since they'd first been built- which had been well before Isobel's attendance regardless of what her students might think- but it was interesting to get a grasp on what had changed. New faces in the corridors, new names on the doors. This was not the same school that she had come to as a student, and she was glad of it. Change was not only inevitable, it was necessary, and it was satisfying to see that Hogwarts was still maintaining its place leading the wizarding world.

Special Ability

Character Name: Isobel Stuart
Age: 65
Character Biography: Link
Do any of your other Characters have Special Abilities?: No
If Yes, then Please provide their name and a link to their bio:
 
Special Ability: Seer

What level is this ability at?: Master

At what age did your character gain this ability?: Birth

How did they learn or hone this ability?:
Isobel was born a Seer, and began making small predictions almost as soon as she could speak, although her parents took little notice for the most part and did not notice for some time that their daughter's random assertions did at times prove true. As she aged, her predictions grew more sophisticated, though less frequent, and increased in accuracy so that, by the time that she began her Divination lessons in her third year, her professor was able to tell quite easily. Five years of Divination lessons gained her an O at NEWT in the subject, then she went on to further develop her abilities under the tutelage of experts in India, where she studied under a number of different Seers whilst in the country on assignment from the Ministry of Magic's Department for International Magical Cooperation, and in France, where she studied first under an old Seer making a living in Muggle fortune-telling, and then under the Beauxbatons Divination professor, who offered her an apprenticeship of sorts as preparation for taking over the position. Since then, she has been honing her abilities chiefly by further practice and independent research as part of a teaching position.

Describe how the Special Ability influences their life.  What do they use it for?:
Isobel has been largely focused on her ability for at least half of her life, with Seeing constituting a fair part of the subject which she has elected to teach. It has become more and more dominant as she has grown older, with her career shifting from international relations into Divination education over the years, and she has been largely guided by the Sight in the career decisions which she has made since leaving the Ministry in her early twenties. She uses the ability not only as part of her teaching and research in the subject, but also to advise herself and those around her in their decisions and choices regarding the future, particularly when it comes to major life decisions.


Write a description of what happens when your character is exhibiting this Special Ability: Using the Sight tends to leave Isobel with a migraine and a sense of great weariness for hours or occasionally days afterwards, depending upon the duration of use and the magnitude of what she has seen. Although these effects have grown less pronounced with practice and experience over the years, they still affect her somewhat, and she can appear tired and wan at times as a result.  Using the Sight largely involves going into a trance of sorts during which Isobel experiences a vision of events to come, allowing her to make prophecies regarding these events. She also gains a particular skill with the varied arts of Divination, ranging from reading tarot cards to palmistry, which she practices regularly.

Your Nickname: Jay
Have you read and do you agree to the Code of Conduct?: Yes
Are you over thirteen? Yes
How did you find us and decide to write with us? RPG Directory
If you have written other characters here: No
If Yes, list them all:
Is this a Primary or Secondary Character?: Primary

Full Character Name: Isobel Mairi Stuart
Character Birthday & Age: 11 January 1947- 65
City & Country of Birth: Edinburgh, Scotland
Blood Purity: Halfblood
Alma Mater: Hogwarts
Job/Position: Divination Professor

Wand: 14 2/3", Silver Lime and Unicorn Hair, Supple

Physical Description:
Tall and slender with a habit of quick, decisive movements, Isobel strikes quite an imposing figure at the best of times, and when she is irritated, it shows, as everything becomes just a little sharper. She walks briskly irrespective of the circumstances, and has little patience with dawdlers; her view is that it is her job to walk and everyone else's to get out of the way. Her hair, somewhere indefinable between blonde and silver, is always kept pinned back out of her face save for on the very rare occasions when she sees fit to dress up. Though her face shows her age, and perhaps then a little more on top, she has no time for beauty charms, and her blue-grey eyes are as sharp as ever, with a penetrating quality which makes many a little uncomfortable.

Personality Description:
Isobel is a woman of high expectations, and so she has little patience for those who fall short of them. Somewhat irascible when tested, she makes many people somewhat nervous, and for good reason, for she has a sharp, sarcastic tongue which she is not afraid to use on anyone, regardless of their position or authority. She has spent much of her life roaming to and fro at her own whim, and so has little time for structured hierarchies, which she makes perfectly clear to those who try to involve her in them. Where she cannot avoid them, it is always her aim to be as close to the top as possible not because she particularly desires power herself but because she cannot abide to have too many other people holding it over her. For Isobel, respect is something which must be earned, and when she gives it, she gives it to the person rather than to the office or title which they hold. Despite a somewhat prickly exterior, however, her heart is in the right place, and although she has little sympathy for those who lack the motivation to help themselves, she is always ready to lend a hand to those in genuine need, so long as they don't mind its being accompanied by dry humour and an utter inability to receive thanks gracefully.

History:
Born in a city still recovering from the ravages of rationing and subject to all sorts of shortages and restrictions, Isobel did not have an easy childhood; the more so as both her parents worked away, with her father being a Healer and her mother an Auror, and consequently spending much of their time down in London. She learned to entertain herself from an early age, spending much time in her formative years out exploring the local fields and woods, or watching birds and foxes from her bedroom window or even from the top of a tree. Perhaps as a consequence, she was always somewhat withdrawn and disinclined to use two words where one would do, to the extent that her mother had some serious concerns about her. She was something of a late developer magically, only showing the first signs around the age of five, and since she spent so much of her time out of the house even at this age, her parent missed many of the indications. Although they were fairly sure, it was still a great relief to them both when Isobel's Hogwarts letter arrived on her eleventh birthday.

Admittedly, her school years did not get off to the best of starts; Isobel managed to reduce two of the three girls with whom she shared a compartment on the Express to tears within the first half an hour through sheer bluntness and perhaps unnecessary honesty. She did somewhat better after this, however, genuinely upset by having caused such havoc, and her Sorting into Ravenclaw was not unhelpful, since it at least meant that she was less likely to have good cause to accuse those around her of idiocy when they proved unable to follow what were, to her, extremely simple arguments. Settling into her classes, she found that none of them posed her any particular difficulty with the significant exception of Potions, a subject which she simply could not get to grips with at all, much to her father's disappointment. She joined one or two clubs, where her quick wit and dry humour were of great use to her, and managed in this way to gather a circle of acquaintances, one or two of whom would, in time, become good friends. Although she did not cultivate a large circle, those that were close to her tended to remain so far more consistently than might have been expected for girls of that age.

Able to choose her elective subjects in her third year, she settled first on Divination, which she had always been fascinated by, and then on Arithmancy, which came a close second. Both subjects quickly took her fancy, and Divination became her favourite very rapidly, so that Isobel most likely put twice as much work into that one class as she did into all the others combined. Despite this, the majority of her teachers had little cause for complaint; she had quick wits and could pick up new concepts rapidly. In Potions, however, her abilities remained mediocre at best, and after completing a good set of OWLs in which that subject was the sole cause of disappointment for her, she took the opportunity to drop it, and looked forward enthusiastically to never having to think about it again. In the meantime, she ploughed ahead with her NEWT choices, and did so in possession of her first boyfriend, a somewhat unusual position for Isobel to find herself in since she had spent most of her previous five years at the school deriding any friend who managed to acquire such a thing for her foolishness. These friends had ample opportunity for revenge when the pair split up less than a month into the new term, and Isobel assuaged any regrets by determinedly beating him in each Arithmancy test that followed.

Having completed her NEWTs and gained superb results, Isobel went into the Ministry of Magic, where she found a role in the Department for International Magical Cooperation which took her across the world to India. Here, she immersed herself enthusiastically in the local culture, and particularly as it pertained to her favourite subject, Divination; she studied under noted Seers and diviners of all disciplines whilst on assignment in the country, being fascinated by the differences she encountered between these methods and those that she had been taught at Hogwarts. Almost every evening, she left her lodgings and ventured out into what might be called the seedier parts of the magical area of town to take lessons, and it was while returning from one of these that she was attacked and almost killed by a group of inebriated local teenagers. Isobel was sent back to Britain immediately and treated for some time by St Mungo's before returning to the Department in a desk role, but the mundanity of the work and sheer boredom drove her to tender her resignation. At the age of twenty, she set out for Paris, where she found work as a pianist in a variety theatre. There, she struck up an acquaintanceship with an old Seer making a little money through performing to Muggles as a fortune teller, with whom she worked for a number of months.

Eventually, though, the wanderlust struck again, and, having improved her stock of French through working in Paris, Isobel disappeared into the depths of the countryside, wandering from village to village and earning a living by any job she could get, working as a waitress one day, a cleaner the next. It was an exciting time and she enjoyed it all thoroughly, but as she approached her thirtieth birthday, she felt the need for a somewhat more permanent living situation, and so she applied for the post of Divination Professor at Beauxbatons Academy. Initially, she was refused on the basis of insufficient teaching experience, but the retiring professor took a fancy to her and invited her to undertake an apprenticeship of sorts, studying under him for a few years years before assuming his position. This was an offer which she accepted, and so in the September following her thirtieth birthday, Isobel Stuart took over as Divination professor at Beauxbatons, a post which she retained for another thirty years, across the period of the Wizarding Wars during which her primary concern was her parents, who still remained in Scotland. Her fears proved justified as her mother passed away during the Second War, and she was regretfully convinced that it would be for the best not to return to Britain for her funeral.

At the age of fifty, she was offered the position of Deputy Headmistress, which she accepted and occupied for the next ten years before receiving word from a friend that her father was dangerously ill. Considering this a sign that it was about time she went back to her roots, Isobel returned to Scotland, and spent the next two months nursing her father before he passed away, leaving her to set his affairs in order. Though she had planned to travel the world once more, she found that her desire to do so was lessened, and for once, she considered the possibility of retirement. In fact, she actually attempted it for a few years before rapidly realising that it would not do for her, and applying to teach Divination at Hogwarts, for which she was accepted. Returning to the scenes of her childhood was a nostalgic experience for her, but she soon settled back into it and set about whipping her students into shape.

Describe your job duties and how you go about them:
As Divination professor, Isobel is responsible for conveying the intricacies of the art to her students through a mixture of practical and theoretical lessons dealing with various different aspects of predicting the future, whether through tasseomancy or tarot. She has little patience with those who do not apply themselves, and has an undeniable gift for spotting them; such students are likely to find themselves in receipt of the sharp edge of Isobel's tongue. Equally, however, she can spot students who are genuinely struggling and will do her best to give them a hand, though she prefers, as the saying runs, to help them to help themselves over doing things for them, believing that this is the only way in which they will truly be able to expand their abilities. In the meantime, students with a genuine interest and enthusiasm for the subject will receive all the aid that she is able to give them, whether that be long and involved conversations about the minutiae of the subject or lending out her possessions, from advanced textbooks to her own crystal balls.

Elaborate on your expertise in your field:
Divination has been Isobel's area of expertise since she was at Hogwarts, and following an excellent NEWT in the subject, she has gone on to study further under a variety of different tutors from all over the world, particularly in her youth in India, where she studied under a number of reputed Seers and diviners whilst on assignment from the Ministry. She also studied for two years under her predecessor at Beauxbatons, acquiring much depth of knowledge and a number of tips regarding the teaching of the subject, before taking over from him. Since then, she has developed her abilities chiefly through independent research and reading in the intervals of her teaching work, and has amassed a considerable collection of reading material dealing with aspects of Divination, to say nothing of her thirty years of previous teaching experience in the subject.

Writing Sample:
Tapping her fingernails gently against the edge of the bed, Isobel looked down at the girl lying in it and sighed. Foolish of her, really, getting so involved in a sport, but she well remembered the excitement and adrenaline which had come with the big matches when she had been at school herself, and she could sympathise... but all the same, going up on a broom when you were in floods of tears to start with would never be a good idea, and Mary MacLeod had proved that conclusively with the aid of a couple of Bludgers.

Her eyes traced the outline of the bruise that covered half the young brunette's face, and she winced in sympathy. "I suppose I should be foolish to ask you how you're feeling?" Isobel's words provoked a slight smile, though that was by no means a good thing since the stretching of the skin evidently produced a somewhat painful effect. Very gently, the older witch patted her student on the shoulder. "Not to worry, not to worry. You'll be fine, and in the mean time..." She gestured to a stack of parchment on the table at the bedside. "You'll be delighted to hear that we professors are all so concerned that we've sent you some homework as a get-well present!" Sharp eyes traced the girl's expression. "Only if you feel up to it, of course. And only if the Matron will let you."

Sum up your character in one paragraph:
Isobel is a sharp-tongued woman with limited patience which she does her best to stretch out across the course of the teaching day. Although she certainly doesn't suffer fools gladly and has no tolerance at all for those who waste time and effort in any way, she does have a heart, contrary to popular opinion, and will always be prepared to help those in genuine need. She has led a varied life in many different parts of the world and is thoroughly cosmopolitan in outlook, taking a keen interest in politics of all forms, but always has the interests of those close to her in mind, and those who can deal with her sarcastic sense of humour will find in her a loyal and stoic friend.